


Just Act Natural

by schweet_heart



Series: Merlin Fic [70]
Category: Merlin (TV)
Genre: Allergies, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Anal Sex, Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Awkward Dates, Awkward First Times, Awkward Sexual Situations, Banter, Bisexual Character, Cuddling & Snuggling, Drunken Kissing, Fake/Pretend Relationship, First Dates, First Kiss, First Time, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Fluff and Humor, Friends to Lovers, Happy Ending, Humor, Idiots in Love, Implied/Referenced Alcohol Abuse/Alcoholism, Implied/Referenced Dubious Consent, Jealous Arthur, Jealous Merlin, M/M, Mutual Pining, Oblivious Arthur, Oblivious Merlin, Office Party, Pining, Pining Arthur, Pining Merlin, Poor Life Choices, Protective Arthur Pendragon (Merlin), Sleepy Cuddles, Tickle Fights, Tickling, Unresolved Sexual Tension
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-08-28
Updated: 2018-08-27
Packaged: 2018-12-20 20:12:55
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 18,563
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/11928387
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/schweet_heart/pseuds/schweet_heart
Summary: Arthur and Merlin are the best of best friends, which is why Arthur lets himself be talked into pretending to be Merlin's boyfriend for the evening. It's only supposed to be for one night, to get that asshole Cenred off Merlin's back, but as it turns out, Arthur maybe likes the role a little too much.Written for Pornalot 2017 Bonus Challenge #4: Fake Relationships and Forced Proximity.





	1. Chapter 1

 

 

“Arthur, I need your help,” Merlin said, dropping down onto Arthur’s bed without bothering to say hello. After nearly ten years of friendship, five of them spent living together, such niceties were generally dispensed with between the two of them as a waste of time and effort, but Arthur couldn’t help feeling that such an unpromising opening to the conversation boded ill for his prospects of a quiet evening in.  
  
“If this is about your chronic inability to knock, I’d be glad to,” Arthur said, not looking up from the stack of papers on his desk. “If it’s about your rapidly deteriorating chances of leaving this room alive, on the other hand, I’m afraid there’s no hope for you.”  
  
“Ha, ha,” Merlin deadpanned. “No, Arthur, I’m serious. I have to go to a work do tonight and I need you to pretend to be my boyfriend.”  
  
Arthur stopped writing.  
  
“I’m sorry,” he said slowly. “Did you just ask me to pretend to be your boyfriend?”  
  
“It’s only for one night,” Merlin said, as if this made things any better. “I wouldn’t ask, only if I don’t show up with someone then Cenred is going to start hitting on me again, and I really can’t deal with being propositioned in front of the coffee-maker every day.”  
  
“Leaving aside the fact that, yes, Cenred sounds deeply creepy and shouldn’t be inflicted on anybody ever, is there any reason you can’t just go to HR about it, instead of setting up this little charade?”  
  
“Well, I _could_ ,” Merlin said. There was something in his voice that suggested he was hedging, and Arthur turned around fully so that he could look him in the eye. “It’s just, well, he maybe sort of implied that he didn’t think I could actually _get_ a boyfriend, and I possibly replied by showing him your picture, and his face went totally green but he still thinks I’m lying so— ”  
  
“So you want me to show up tonight and prove it,” Arthur finished. In spite of himself, the idea made him grin a little. “My, my, Merlin, who knew you could be such a devious bastard?”  
  
Merlin straightened. “Does that mean you’ll do it?”  
  
“It means I’ll consider it,” Arthur corrected. “If there’s something in it for me.”  
  
Merlin shot him a narrow-eyed glare. “I am _not_ having sex with you.”  
  
Arthur sputtered. “I didn’t mean _that_ , you dough-brained pillock. Just buy me a nice bottle of red, or something. Honestly, you’re the worst fake boyfriend ever.”  
  
Arthur was fairly sure he had imagined the brief look of disappointment that crossed Merlin’s face.  
  
“All right,” he said. “A bottle of wine, and you’re mine for the night?”  
  
Arthur gave his most put-upon sigh. “Fine. But it had better be the good stuff, mind. Not that cheap crap you get on sale at the supermarket.”  
  
“Yes! Thank you, Arthur, you have no idea.” So saying, Merlin bounced to his feet, gave Arthur a hurried peck on the cheek, and flew out the door, presumably to get ready for dinner. “We leave in half an hour, so you’d better be ready to go!” he called over his shoulder. Arthur stared after him, blinking.  
  
Tonight was going to be a very…interesting experience.

 

*

 

Arthur had seen Merlin in a tux before, once or twice, but usually only a fleeting glimpse before he bundled himself out the door to wherever it was he was going. Given the opportunity for closer inspection, however, he had to admit his best friend cleaned up well.  
  
“Well done, Merlin,” he said, looking him up and down frankly. “You almost look half decent.”  
  
Merlin rolled his eyes. “You can’t talk to me like that,” he said. “You’re my boyfriend. You’re supposed to be _nice_.”  
  
“I don’t recall signing up for that,” Arthur said, keeping his face straight with an effort. “You never said I had to be your _doting_ boyfriend. That’s going to take a lot more work.”  
  
Merlin’s glare made him smirk.  
  
“Fine,” Merlin said. He grabbed Arthur’s coat and chucked it at him. “Bottle of wine _and_ a box of chocolates. Are you happy now?”  
  
“The ones with the caramel centres?” Arthur inquired.  
  
“Of course. What do you take me for?”  
  
“I suppose that’s acceptable.” Arthur held the door open for him, and ushered him through. “Come on, we’re late already.”  
  
Merlin shot him a dubious look, but did as he was told.

 

*

 

“Merlin, you made it!” A dark-haired, good-looking bloke greeted Merlin with a smile when the two of them stepped into the reception hall. “I almost didn’t think you were going to show.”  
  
His welcoming expression changed to a scowl when he saw that Merlin had company, and for a moment Arthur had to fight back a laugh. This must be Cenred.  
  
“I’m afraid I held him up,” Arthur said smoothly, holding out a hand. “I got stuck in traffic. Hullo, I’m Arthur. Merlin’s boyfriend.”  
  
“Yes, he said.” Cenred glanced from Arthur’s outstretched hand to Merlin, who was watching the exchange with his bottom lip caught between his teeth. “I’m Cenred, one of Merlin's workmates. I must say, it’s a surprise to see you here. You haven’t been to one of our ‘do’s before, have you?”  
  
“Busy job,” Arthur said, smiling with perhaps a few too many teeth. “I’m a barrister. I don’t really have that much time for socialising on a work night, but Merlin asked me to come, so here I am.”  
  
“Lucky Merlin,” Cenred said, with an overly cheerful grin. Arthur’s smile widened, and he turned back to his ‘date,’ making a show of sliding a hand possessively down Merlin’s back.  
  
"Lucky me," he said. "Don't you think?"  
  
Cenred looked ready to spit nails. "Of course," he gritted out. "You two have a good time, now."  
  
“Oh, we will." Arthur promised. He leaned close to Merlin's ear. "Come on, love,” he murmured, and was amused when Merlin shivered. “You promised you were going to introduce me to your boss, remember?”  
  
Merlin, who was looking a trifle dazed now, took Arthur’s arm and allowed himself to be steered across the dance floor. Arthur gave the glowering Cenred a gleeful wave, and managed to suppress his snickering until they were out of earshot and mingling with the crowd near the buffet table.  
  
“You,” he said, poking Merlin in the chest, “owe me _big_ , mate. Did you see the look on his face?”  
  
“Yeah,” Merlin said vaguely. “I saw it.”  
  
“Well? Don’t you think I did a brilliant job? I’m the best fake boyfriend ever, if I do say so myself.”  
  
When Merlin still didn’t respond, Arthur dropped his grin and looked at him properly. He was clutching a flute of champagne he must have picked up from a passing waiter, and looked mildly upset about something, his forehead wrinkled the way it always got when he was trying to puzzle out a crossword clue that was too difficult for him to understand. Regardless of how much Arthur might tease him, he knew Merlin wasn’t as stupid as he sometimes pretended, so whenever he saw that expression Arthur knew something was going on.  
  
“What is it?” he asked, taking the champagne gently from Merlin’s hand and putting it down on a nearby table. “You look rather constipated. Is his opinion really that important to you?”  
  
“What? Oh, no, it’s not that.” Merlin blinked at him, roused from whatever reverie had been occupying his brain. “Sorry, I think I just — drifted off, for a minute. You were perfect, honestly. I don’t think he’ll bother me again after that performance. Thanks.”  
  
“You’re welcome,” Arthur said slowly. Now it was his turn to frown. “Merlin, what’s going on?”

“Nothing,” Merlin said. Then he seemed to think better of it. “No, just — isn't this just a little bit weird, the two of us together like this? As boyfriends, I mean. Don’t you find it kind of strange?”  
  
Arthur raised his eyebrows. “Not really?" he said, wondering why he should. “You're my best mate. It's not like people haven't assumed we're together before.”  
  
“Yeah, but that's the thing,” Merlin said earnestly. "Usually it's them making the assumptions and us correcting them, but now it’s like — it doesn’t even seem odd to me, that's all. And I think maybe it should.”  
  
“So, your problem is that you _don’t_ have a problem with it?” Arthur asked, wanting to clarify. When Merlin nodded, he rolled his eyes. “You’re an extremely strange person, Merlin, has anyone ever told you that?”  
  
“You tell me all the time,” Merlin said drily. “It’s part of what I love about you.”  
  
Arthur snagged his own glass of champagne and toasted Merlin with it. “Precisely,” he said. “And don’t you forget it.”

 

*

 

With the main objective of his attendance already accomplished, Arthur spent the rest of the evening with Merlin on his arm, sampling hors d’oeuvres and drinking probably-inadvisable amounts of cheap champagne.  
  
“You’re having way too much fun with this,” Merlin accused him, the third time he caught Arthur making up a ludicrous story about how they’d met for an enthralled audience. Arthur just shrugged.  
  
“I like your workmates,” he said. “And they obviously like me. It’s not my fault they keep asking me stupid questions.”  
  
“That doesn’t mean you should actually _answer_ them.”  
  
Arthur stared. “Why shouldn’t I?”  
  
“Because!” Merlin threw up his hands. “They believe you! They’re going to compare stories in the break room tomorrow and realise I’m dating a colossal liar.”  
  
Arthur chuckled and shook his head. “They’re just going to think we met somewhere boring and I didn’t want to tell them about it,” he said, reeling Merlin in by his lapels and kissing him on the nose. “Relax. They think I’m adorable.”  
  
He waggled his eyebrows, and Merlin gave a reluctant laugh. “I’m still knocking your bottle of wine down a couple of price brackets,” he said, and Arthur gave a mock gasp.  
  
“Treachery!” he said, clutching at his chest. “And from my own true love. Say it isn’t so.”  
  
“You ham,” Merlin grumbled, but he was smiling.

 

*

 

He was back to being quiet again by the time they left, however, and Arthur might have been drunk, but he wasn’t so drunk he didn’t realise something was wrong.  
  
“Hey.” He leaned over onto Merlin’s side of the taxi seat, nudging him with his shoulder. “Boyfriend, lover, light of my life. I'd offer a penny for your thoughts, but I'm not sure they're worth that much. Spill.”  
  
Merlin jumped a little. “It’s nothing,” he said automatically, not meeting Arthur’s gaze. “I’m just tired.”  
  
Arthur narrowed his eyes. “Tired tired, or ‘I'm mad and I don’t want to talk about it’ tired?”  
  
Merlin sighed. “You really don’t think there’s anything weird about tonight?” he asked, playing with a bit of cracked leather from the seat cushion. “It didn’t strike you as strange or unusual in any way.”  
  
Arthur shook his head, thinking back over the evening. Some of Merlin’s friends _were_ a little weird, especially that one guy who had ended up dancing on the buffet table wearing a tie around his head. But they hadn’t struck him as particularly odd, in general. “No. Should it?”  
  
Somehow, Merlin managed to slump down further in his seat, listing slightly so that his head rested against Arthur’s shoulder. “No,” he murmured, and Arthur got the feeling that there was something he was missing, somewhere, though he couldn’t think what it might be. “No, I suppose not.”


	2. Chapter 2

 

“I think we should break up,” Merlin announced, walking into the kitchen the next morning and stealing Arthur’s toast. Arthur had seen Merlin in various shades of hung over before, and he knew better than to try and wrestle his breakfast back from his housemate. That way lay broken crockery and hurt feelings. He sighed and put another two slices of bread in the toaster.

 

“We’re not even dating,” he said.

 

“No, because we broke up.”

 

“Merlin,” Arthur said, very patiently. “In order to break up, you have to be dating first. Breaking up is what you do when you decide to stop dating. Which we’re not doing.”

 

“But I think we _are_ , though,” Merlin insisted. “That’s what I was trying to tell you yesterday, only I was too confused and then too drunk to sort it out. The reason last night was strange was because it _wasn’t strange_.”

 

Arthur decided he needed another cup of coffee before he could try and work this out. 

 

“So what you’re saying,” he said, once he’d finished a second cup and was halfway through his third, “is that we’re dating.”

 

“Think about it,” Merlin said. “I buy you presents.”

 

“Bribes.”

 

“You nag me about my cereal choices.”

 

“Only because you insist on eating that _crap_ every morning.”

 

“You acted like a possessive dick in front of Cenred,” Merlin said relentlessly. “You _kissed_ me.” 

 

Arthur sputtered, because all right, yes, but he’d been drunk, and anyway, Merlin had more or less asked him to. Besides, Merlin had kissed him first. 

 

“See?” Merlin pointed a triumphant finger at him. “You can’t even deny it. We’re dating.”

 

“Even if we were,” Arthur said, “which does not, by the way, mean that I concede that we are, what’s the problem?” He leered at Merlin. “Aren’t you satisfied, darling?”

 

Interestingly, Merlin turned beet red and nearly dropped his coffee mug. “ _Arthur_.” 

 

“What? You started it.”

 

“Fine.” Merlin huffed. “If you must know, I’m not. Satisfied, I mean. How long has it been since either of us have had a serious relationship that lasted more than a few months? Answer me honestly, Arthur.”

 

Arthur shrugged. “A while, I guess,” he said. “What does that have to do with anything?”

 

“Well, don’t you think the two things might be connected?” Merlin gestured meaningfully with his mug, and Arthur hastily relieved him of it before he could slop coffee all over the counter. “I mean, Cedric even told me it was a problem when he broke up with me, I just didn’t really understand what he meant.”

 

“If I recall, you told me he was crazy,” Arthur said. He took a sip of Merlin’s coffee and made a face. Far too much sugar, as usual. 

 

“That’s because I thought he was. But I’m starting to think maybe he was onto something.” He frowned. “He said we were like an old married couple.” 

 

“So you want to, what—get a divorce?”

 

“Something like that.” Merlin retrieved his coffee, finished it, and ran his finger around the bottom of the cup chasing sugar granules. Dis _gus_ ting. “I just think maybe we should…step back a little. You know. Try not to spend so much time together.”

 

“O-kaay,” Arthur said, some of his earlier amusement fading as he thought about what that would entail. He liked Merlin. He liked spending time with Merlin. He did not like the idea of deliberately _not_ spending time with Merlin just because he had some kind of bee in his bonnet about them being boyfriends. 

 

Unfortunately, he also knew from experience that Merlin wasn’t going to let this go until he’d gotten it out of his system. “And you think that will help?”

 

“Who knows?” Now it was Merlin’s turn to shrug. “It’s worth a try. You’ve been thinking of asking Vivian out for a while, right? And there’s a new guy in our IT department who has been flirting with me for weeks.”

 

“Won’t Cenred be suspicious, if he sees you with some other guy?”

 

“What Cenred doesn’t know won’t hurt him,” Merlin said darkly. “Or me.”

 

Arthur studied his face. He looked, regrettably, serious. “All right, fine. Consider us broken up.”

 

“Okay. Good,” Merlin said. He hesitated for a moment, as if there were something else he wanted to say, then changed his mind and nodded firmly. “Good. So be it.”

 

 

*

 

 

The trouble with Merlin, Arthur found, was that he had an annoying habit of being right at the most inconvenient moments, something which Arthur frequently didn’t find out until _after_ it came back to bite him in the arse. 

 

“Oh, I thought you were with that Merlin bloke,” Vivian said, when Arthur invited her on a date the following day. “Aren’t you, like, gay or something?”

 

Arthur stared at her for a long moment. “Obviously not,” he said. “Since I’m asking you out. But if you must know, I’m bi. Merlin’s the one who’s gay.”

 

“Yeah, but you are _together,_ right?” She made a little twirling motion with her finger, apparently to indicate the connection between him and his flatmate-slash-best friend-slash-unexpectedly convincing significant other. “Because my friend Ellie said she saw the two of you kissing, once, and he’s all over your computer screen, so I guess I just assumed…”

 

Arthur looked from his desktop wallpaper—which, okay, was a holiday shot of him and Merlin dicking around on the beach, but there was nothing particularly romantic about it—then back to the woman leaning against the door of his office, her blond curls gleaming. “We’re just friends,” he said. “Look, do you want to go out to dinner with me, or not?”

 

Vivian looked him up and down, her gaze travelling critically from the top of Arthur’s head to the tips of his shiny, patent-leather shoes. It was, Arthur thought, rather similar to the way a show dog must feel when being paraded in front of the judges' panel. Not that he knew anything about dog showing other than what he had managed to glean from one particularly weird night in front of the TV, _thank you, Merlin_. “All right,” she said at last. “Pick me up tomorrow night at eight. And don't be late.” 

 

"I wouldn't dream of it," Arthur assured her.

 

 

*

 

 

When Arthur came home that evening, Merlin was just getting ready to go out again.

 

“But,” Arthur said, watching him fuss with his hair in front of the hallway mirror. “It’s curry night.”

 

“I have a date with Gwaine tonight. The bloke from from IT?” Merlin said, and he actually looked excited about it. Arthur couldn’t remember him looking that excited about a date since that girl Freya back in secondary, and that hadn’t exactly ended well. “Sorry, but he seemed keen, and I figured tonight was as good a night as any. You don’t mind, do you?”

 

Arthur did mind. Arthur had been expecting to be able to crash on the sofa with some Indian food and his best bloody friend to talk to, certain that Merlin would be as entertained by Vivian’s obliviousness as he was. But Arthur had also agreed that they would be ‘broken up’ from now on, stupid as that was, which apparently meant standing back and saying things like, “No, of course not,” and “You look great. Have fun!” when what he really wanted to do was pin Merlin to the couch and not let him leave. Arthur liked his routine, and Merlin was part of that routine, and he wasn’t at all pleased about having to eat curry and watch shit TV shows all by himself. He could only hope that Merlin would get bored of the whole look-how-not-a-couple-we-are thing eventually and life could subsequently go back to normal.

 

Arthur didn’t want to think about what might happen if Merlin decided that he _liked_ not being with Arthur and would prefer to move in with his new boyfriend instead. It was too terrible even to contemplate, and therefore it would never happen. 

 

 

*

 

 

“I have a date with Vivian,” Arthur made a point of saying loudly, when it was his turn to go out the following evening. “We’re going to dinner.”

 

“That’s nice,” Merlin said, sounding a trifle distracted. He had a spoonful of cereal halfway to his mouth and was using his free hand to text someone on his phone. “Have fun!”

 

Unlike Arthur, it sounded like he actually meant it. Or maybe he was just more interested in the extremely lewd sext he had just received. Arthur peered over his shoulder. “I don’t think that’s anatomically possible,” he said, and watched interestedly as Merlin’s ears blushed. 

 

“Do you _mind_?”

 

“Only if you try that on any of the surfaces in this flat,” Arthur assured him. Seriously, Merlin was far too easy to tease. “Or in my bedroom. In fact, just don’t bring Gavin around here at all.” 

 

“His name is Gwaine,” Merlin said, and he didn’t sound so absent-minded anymore. He lowered his phone and looked up at Arthur, eyes narrowed. “I like him, and I have every intention of bringing him around if I so choose. So be nice.”

 

“I’m always nice.”

 

Merlin just stared at him. “Cedric,” he said. “ _Will_.”

 

“To people who deserve it,” Arthur amended. And anyway, it wasn’t his fault that he and Will never got along; Will had a chip on his shoulder the size of the entire continent. “If this Wayne fellow seems like a decent enough bloke, then of course I will be nice to him. I’m not rude to people for the fun of it, Merlin.”

 

“Could have fooled me,” Merlin muttered. Arthur rolled his eyes.

 

“Fine,” he said. “ _If,_ on the off-chance, I ever actually meet this… _Gwaine,_ then I promise I'll be on my best behaviour. All right?”

 

“Cross your heart and hope to die?” 

 

“Stick a needle in my eye,” Arthur said solemnly, because he knew it would make Merlin gag. “Deal?”

 

“I hate you,” Merlin said, which Arthur took to mean ‘yes.’ “Are you planning on bringing your date back here tonight? Should I be gone when you get home? I can always make myself scarce and, I don’t know—” He blushed still further. “—hang out with Gwaine.” 

 

That wasn’t his I'm-planning-to-have-sex face, and if he had an expression that amounted to an I’m-thinking-of-running-away-with-this-bloke-I-just-met face, Arthur had thankfully never seen it. It was, however, very close to his I-might-just-be-in-love face, and all at once, Arthur was visited with the abrupt and disquieting realisation that he hadn’t actually heard Merlin come home last night. “No,” he said curtly, before he could change his mind. “That won’t be necessary. Vivian is—very shy,” he extemporised, since fortunately Merlin had never met Vivian and had no idea that she was really anything but. “I highly doubt we’ll get that far on our _first date_.” 

 

“Okay,” Merlin said, in tones which suggested he knew Arthur was lying but had decided not to call him on it. “Have fun with Veronica.” 

 

“Vivian,” Arthur corrected, before realising Merlin was messing with him. With an irritated huff, he turned around and stalked out the door.

 


	3. Chapter 3

 

“It’s not that the sex was bad,” Vivian said, some weeks later. 

 

“I should think not,” Arthur said, offended.

 

“It wasn’t _bad_ ,” Vivian repeated, which wasn’t exactly reassuring. “But I can’t help feeling like maybe your heart wasn’t in it.”

 

Arthur sighed and flopped back against the pillows. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I’ve just been a bit distracted.”

 

He had been told he was an insensitive prick before, but even Arthur knew that specifying exactly _why_ he was distracted would not be a good idea. It wasn’t like there was anything Vivian could do about it, anyway. He ran a hand lightly down her side, smiling when she giggled and batted him away. “We could always try again?”

 

“I have to get going,” she said, somewhat regretfully, shoving at him until he let her up. “But maybe you could try to work on getting _un_ distracted before next week?”

 

“What’s next week?” he asked, and Vivian glared at him.

 

“Just for that,” she said. “You’re showering alone.”

 

 

*

 

 

“So, I think Vivian just broke up with me,” Arthur said, slumping onto a stool behind their kitchen counter. Merlin made sympathetic noises from the cupboard under the sink, which was where he had taken to hiding his latest stash of tooth-rotting cereals. Arthur had discovered them the week before and replaced them all with some variation of sugar-free All Bran—friends didn’t let friends contract diabetes, if they could help it—but Merlin had been away so often lately that apparently he hadn’t noticed. “She said I wasn’t taking our relationship seriously enough.”

 

“Well, were you taking the relationship seriously enough?” Merlin asked. He opened the top of one of the boxes and fetched a bowl from the cupboard. 

 

“I thought I was.” Arthur crunched morosely into his toast. “But she wanted to go to Paris for our three month anniversary, and I said three months was too soon to have an anniversary, and she said if that was how I felt about things, maybe we weren’t best suited to one another after all.”

 

Arthur could tell that Merlin was trying to look sympathetic, but his mouth kept twitching and betraying him.

 

“It does sound like you both wanted different things,” he said finally. “At least you’re better off finding out sooner rather than later, right?”

 

“I suppose.” Arthur glanced at him sidelong. “How are things with Gwaine from IT?”

 

Merlin’s face lit up, and Arthur bit savagely into another slice of toast as he rattled on about his boyfriend’s many amazing attributes. Arthur did not like Gwaine from IT. In fact, he defied anyone to like Gwaine from IT, unless they were Merlin and by definition found it impossible to dislike anyone. Gwaine was the sort of IT geek who thought “have you tried turning it off and then on again” counted as sexual innuendo.

 

Gwaine could make anything sound like sexual innuendo. It was part of why Arthur disliked him. 

 

“…so I said it would be fine if he came to stay here for the weekend,” Merlin was saying. “But only if you’re okay with it, of course.” 

 

“What?” Arthur said, blinking. He had been so busy ruminating on how much he disliked Gwaine that he hadn’t heard Merlin properly; it almost sounded like he’d invited Gwaine to stay for the weekend. “Sorry, I didn’t quite catch that.”

 

“Gwaine,” Merlin said, in the exaggeratedly patient tones of someone talking to the very drunk—or the very irritating. “He needs a place to crash next weekend while his flat is being fumigated. I told him he could stay here, as long as you said it was okay.” 

 

He was looking up at Arthur with big doe eyes and the sort of pleading expression that made Arthur want to wrap him up in a blanket and feed him life-threateningly sweet cocoa puffs until he smiled again. It was the most lethal weapon in Merlin’s arsenal and invariably made Arthur want to give him anything he asked for, which was why it had been explicitly outlawed by the Flatmate Convention of 2015 (barring cases of dire emergency).

 

This did not count as a dire emergency.

 

“Please, Arthur?” Merlin said, still doing his best wounded Bambi impression. “He really is desperate.” 

 

Arthur wouldn’t piss on Gwaine if he were on fire, but he would do anything for Merlin. He sighed. “You really like him, huh?” 

 

Merlin made an affronted noise. “I wouldn’t invite him to stay if he were just anybody,” he said, even though he totally would. “I know you hate it when other people invade your space for too long, but it will only be for a couple of days. You won’t even notice that he’s here.” 

 

Arthur had his doubts about that, to be quite honest, but it was obviously too late now. “Fine,” he said, dropping the rest of his toast in the bin. For some reason, he seemed to have lost his appetite. “Whatever.”

 

The worst part of it was, Merlin was so excited by the idea of having a sleepover with his _boy toy_ that he didn’t even notice Arthur had switched his cereal. 

 

Arthur tried not to take that as a sign.

 

 

*

 

 

“Evening, Princess,” Gwaine greeted him the following Friday, when Arthur opened the door to let him in. He had a bottle of wine cradled in one arm and a six-pack of beer in the other, along with a backpack full of who-knew-what strapped to his back. “Long time no see.”

  
“Not long enough,” Arthur muttered, not quite under his breath, but Gwaine just laughed, craning his neck over Arthur’s shoulder to peer into the flat. 

 

“Nice place,” he said, with an appreciative whistle. “Guess that’s what comes from being the son of a multimillionaire, huh?” The flat had been a bequest from Arthur's mother, actually, but Arthur wasn’t about to volunteer that information to someone who clearly thought of inherited wealth as some kind of disease. “Is Merlin about? I thought he said he’d be here to meet me.”

 

“I’m here!” Merlin called, tumbling into the room. He looked breathless and slightly flushed, his hair still damp from the shower. He had been anxious all day, fussing over the state of the flat as though they were expecting a visit from the Queen and worrying about whether they’d be able to give Gwaine a proper welcome, what with having only one and a half placemats instead of three. Personally, Arthur’s idea of a ‘proper welcome’ was installing a trap door under the welcome mat that would, in an ideal world, send Gwaine from IT back down to the bowels of hell from whence he came, but alas, such improvements could not be made on such short notice. 

 

“Hey Merls,” Gwaine said, kissing Merlin’s cheek and ruffling his hair. “How’s it hanging?”

 

Merlin blushed—actually _blushed_ —and glanced at Arthur, looking far more flustered than he had any right to. Also, that was a _stupid_ nickname. “I’m fine,” Merlin said, ushering Gwaine inside and taking the bottle of wine from him. “It’s so good to see you! Come on in and make yourself at home.”

 

Arthur shot Gwaine a dark look, hoping to indicate that he was not  to do any such thing, but this seemed to have no effect, as Gwaine just clapped him on the shoulder as he passed and shot him a jaunty wink that could have meant anything.

 

“Is it Monday yet?” Arthur whined sotto voce, as he cornered Merlin by the fridge under the pretext of helping him put away the alcohol. “Honestly, Merlin, I don’t know what you see in him. He's like a poor man's Han Solo.”

 

“You promised to behave,” Merlin said, frowning at him. “And that means no insults. And no, you can’t go off and sulk in your room, either. It won’t kill you to make conversation.”

 

Arthur glowered, but he knew better than to argue. He’d never broken a promise to Merlin in his life, and he had no intention of letting _Gwaine from IT_  cause him to break his streak. Nevertheless, it was difficult to remember that fact when he saw that, instead of sitting on the armchair like any self-respecting guest _ought_ to do, Gwaine had plunked himself down at one end of the over-stuffed sofa, allowing just enough space for Merlin to curl up next to him and leaving Arthur as the odd one out. Arthur clenched his fists and inhaled deeply, reminding himself that he was a Pendragon, and he had been raised to be polite in company.

 

“So, did you catch the game last Friday night?” he asked, settling himself gingerly onto the armchair, which creaked. “Man U are playing quite well this season, don’t you think?”

 

“Nah, mate,” Gwaine said easily, flashing Arthur a shit-eating grin. “I’m an Arsenal fan, myself.” 

 

He seemed quite proud of that fact, and Arthur could only stare at him in unabashed horror. It was going to be a very _long_ weekend. 

 

 

*

 

 

To Arthur’s annoyance, the first evening of Gwaine’s visit actually wasn’t so bad. Gwaine was a cheerful, talkative guest, clearly on his best behaviour, and if he weren’t dating Arthur’s best friend and therefore probably dodgy by default, Arthur might even have found himself liking him.

 

“He’s not so bad, is he?” Merlin said knowingly, grinning at Arthur when Gwaine finally disappeared to go to the bathroom. “I knew the two of you would get along, if you just gave him a chance.”

 

“He’s all right,” Arthur said, setting his jaw. “But he smiles too much.”

 

Merlin let out an incredulous laugh. “He _smiles too much_? That’s—that’s not even a legitimate criticism, that’s just you being petty!”

 

Arthur scowled, but didn’t respond. Something about Gwaine unsettled him, and he wasn’t quite sure what it was. Maybe it was the fact that he kept touching Merlin—a hand on his back, an elbow in the ribs, an arm around his shoulders. Apart from the kiss at the door, he didn’t seem big on PDA, for which Arthur was thankful, and it wasn’t as if Arthur himself wasn’t relatively touchy-feely when it came to his friends. The problem was, with Gwaine draped all over Merlin there was no room for Arthur, and Merlin had been _Arthur’s_ best friend long before he’d been Gwaine’s boyfriend. It really wasn’t fair. 

 

“Arthur?” Merlin prompted after a moment, and Arthur realised he’d gotten caught up in his own thoughts again. “You really don’t mind if he stays, do you? Because if you honestly hate him, we can work something else out, I promise.” 

 

The knowledge that Merlin was willing to put his feelings first in spite of everything made Arthur feel slightly guilty about being such an ass. “I don’t hate him,” he said, sighing heavily to indicate that it was a _very_ close thing. “And it would be rude to turn him out now that he’s here. I'll just have to put up with him for a night or two.”

 

“How generous of you,” Merlin said drily. “Don’t strain yourself.”

 

“I won’t,” Arthur assured him. “If it gets to be too much for me to handle, he can always kip on the fire escape. He gets a place to sleep, and we won't asphyxiate from the fumes of all that hair gel. Problem solved.”

 

And that, Arthur thought, smirking, as Merlin promptly choked on his tea, was why he was still Merlin’s best friend, regardless of however many of his boyfriends tried to come between them. He’d like to see _Gwaine_ make Merlin laugh like that.


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

>  **Content note:** part of this chapter depicts Arthur getting really drunk and having a somewhat ick encounter with Sophia at a club. It doesn't go beyond some dub-con kissing and a close brush with alcohol poisoning, but if that kind of thing bothers you, you might want to skip the section after Arthur storms out of the flat.

 

Over the following day, Arthur’s interactions with Gwaine went something like this:

 

 **Saturday, 8:23am:** attempted to have a nice, hot shower after a brief lie-in, only to discover that there was no more hot water. Apparently, Gwaine liked hot showers too, and it took him forever to get all that gunk out of his hair. He was very sorry, but how was he to know that Arthur didn’t get up at the crack of dawn to bathe like most people? 

 

 **Saturday, 8:36am:** after a cold shower (which involved much swearing and cursing beneath the freezing spray), went into the kitchen to find Gwaine _burning the last of the toast_. He claimed he enjoyed it better that way, but judging from the amount of crumbs and scraped-off burnt bits in the sink, Arthur did not believe him. Was forced to eat revolting sugary cereal instead. Merlin took way too much pleasure in this. 

 

 **Saturday, 10:42am:** walked in on Gwaine and Merlin canoodling in the living room. Walked back out again.

 

 **Saturday, 10:43am:** realised he had left his laptop in the living room, and had to brave the kissing gauntlet for a second time in order to retrieve it. Locked self in room afterwards and wondered whether he could rely on his father to bail him out if he accidentally murdered his best friend’s boyfriend.

 

 **Saturday, 2:43pm:** finally driven out of his room by ravenous hunger only to find the flat completely empty, with a note on the counter saying Merlin and Gwaine had gone to see a movie and would have dinner out. Was torn between indignation at not having been invited—they better not have gone to see _Star Wars_ without him—and sheer bliss at being alone in the flat. Did not, no matter what anyone claims, do a small victory dance around the kitchen to celebrate.

 

 **Saturday, 2:44pm:** definitely did not get caught doing said dance by their next-door neighbour, Mr. Garrah, who had come over to borrow a cup of sugar. That would have been wholly undignified. And embarrassing.

 

 

*

 

 

On Sunday morning, Arthur’s boss called him into the office, and for once Arthur didn’t resent the fact that he was being asked to give up one of his precious free days for yet another emergency. Anything was worth escaping the menace that was his current houseguest.

 

As it turned out, however, the case he had been called in on was a bad one, which meant that Arthur was already in a foul temper by the time he came home later that evening. He trudged up the steps to the flat, his mind still churning with crime scene photos and complicated legal arguments, only to be immediately confronted by the sight of Merlin and Gwaine curled up on the sofa. The two of them looked so comfortable together, and so oblivious to his presence, that Arthur felt almost as though  _he_ were the outsider. He wondered if this was what his life would be like, years from now, when Merlin had happily settled down with someone (please God, not Gwaine) and their friendship had dwindled to a few phone calls a month and the occasional boys' night at the local pub. It did nothing to help his mood.

 

“Hey, Arthur,” Gwaine said, when he finally glanced up and noticed him hovering in the doorway. Merlin turned to smile at Arthur as well, his eyes lighting up in welcome, but the smile died when he caught sight of Arthur’s expression.

 

“Rough day?” he asked. Arthur just shrugged, and Merlin made a sympathetic face, holding out a bowl full of something in Arthur’s direction. “You should try some of these. Gwaine bought them this afternoon—they’re delicious. Guaranteed to cheer you up.”

 

Arthur squinted at him, feeling illogically angry that Merlin could think _food_ was somehow the answer to all life’s problems. “Are those sugar-frosted cornflakes?”

 

“Yeah,” Merlin said, looking down at the dish in his hands. “So?”

 

“So, it’s nearly eight in the evening, Merlin,” Arthur snapped, scowling at him. Usually he found Merlin’s idiosyncrasies endearing, or at least a tolerable shade of obnoxious. Tonight, however, he was tired, and he found his temper fraying. “Why can’t you eat like a grown-up for once?”

 

“Hey, lay off—” Gwaine began, starting to get to his feet, but Merlin put a hand on his arm.

 

“Arthur,” he said. “Is everything all right?” 

 

“Everything’s _fine_ ,” Arthur snarled, so vehemently that even Merlin recoiled. “I’m going out.” 

 

“But you just got in!”

 

“So what? I’m sure you’ll have more fun without me, anyway.” Arthur spun on his heel and stalked out of the room, chucking his briefcase on the side table as he passed. It landed with a satisfying _thunk_ before skidding off onto the floor.

 

“Make sure you take a cab home, okay?” Merlin called after him—he almost sounded upset. “And text me if you’re going to be back very late.”

 

Arthur ignored him, jerking his coat from the hook and heading straight back out the way he’d come. At this point, he wasn't sure whether he ought to bother coming home at all. 

 

 

*

 

 

Sophia was nice. Arthur liked Sophia. She had soft blonde hair and she smelled good, and she kept buying him drinks to help him forget about the things that—well, that he was trying to forget about. 

 

“And _then_ ,” he said, vaguely aware that he was slurring his words but no longer in any shape to prevent it, “he said I was being rude. _I_ was being rude, when clearly it was Gwaine who—”

 

“Yeah, okay, whatever,” Sophia said, flipping her hair over her shoulder. “I get it, Dwayne is a bad guy. Can we please move on? Here, drink this.”

 

She handed him another shot glass, and Arthur blinked at it unsteadily for a moment, before remembering that the contents were supposed to go in his mouth. The alcohol burned as he swallowed it down, and Sophia patted his cheek. “Good boy,” she cooed, pressing her lips to his in a sloppy kiss. “Don’t you feel better now?” 

 

Arthur didn’t feel better, actually—he felt a little like he wanted to be sick, and the room was beginning to spin like some kind of Ferris wheel. He pushed Sophia away and staggered out of his seat, only to regret it a moment later as the floor dipped alarmingly beneath him. He would probably have fallen if it weren't for a pair of unfamiliar hands grabbing hold of him at the last minute, steadying him until he could regain his balance. 

 

"Thanks," he said, bracing himself. "Must've stood up too fast. Got all—heh. Dizzy." 

 

“No problem.” A woman with dark hair and kind brown eyes wavered into view in front of him, her forehead creased with concern. “Listen, are you all right? You look like you’re about to pass out."

 

"Fine." Arthur straightened as best he could against the uneven flooring, tugging the hem of his shirt back into place. "'m not drunk."

 

"Yeah, okay. Soph, what did you do to him?"

 

“Nothing he didn’t want me to do.” Sophia pouted. “Why do you always act like it's my fault?”

 

“Because I know what you're like when you're pissed.” The woman glared at her. “How much have the two of you had to drink?”

 

“I lost track." Sophia shrugged. "Anyway, I don't see what the big deal is. Arthur here wanted to get wasted; I just helped him get there quicker. And look, it worked! I bet he’d strip off and dance on the table if I told him to,” she mused, patting Arthur’s cheek. “Wouldn’t you, sweetie?”

 

“Seriously, Soph, that’s enough.” The dark-haired woman turned to Arthur, peering into his face with concern. “Arthur, is it? Is there someone I can call to take you home?”

 

Arthur nodded, feeling the first stirrings of relief underneath the alcoholic haze. That, at least, was a question he knew the answer to. 

 

“Merlin,” he said. “Call Merlin.”

 

She blinked at him for a few seconds like he'd said something strange, then shook her head and held out her hand for his phone. "All right," she said. "Merlin it is."

 

 

*

 

 

The next thing Arthur remembered, he was waking up in his own bed with the mother of all hangovers. His mouth felt like it had been lined with sandpaper, and some kind of mining colony had taken up residence in his frontal lobe, making him dearly wish for the sweet release of death.

 

“So, you are alive then.” Merlin jerked the curtains open—probably for effect, since it was already early evening judging from the light outside. Arthur cringed and rolled over anyway, wondering when the insides of his eye sockets had been scrubbed out with bleach. “I was starting to wonder.”

 

“No thanks to you,” Arthur croaked. “Admit it. You’re trying to kill me so that you and Gwaine can take over the flat, aren’t you?”

 

“Don’t be stupid,” Merlin said, and he actually sounded annoyed for once. “Who do you think held your head over the loo last night? And Gwaine’s gone. He left this morning. _Not_ that I expect you would have been conscious enough to notice.” In contrast to the harshness of his words, Merlin palm was cool and comforting as he rested it on Arthur's forehead, then very gently stroked his fringe back, combing out the tangles with his fingers. “You should have been nicer to him, you know. He really wasn’t _trying_ to rile you up all the time.” 

 

“I’m sorry,” Arthur said, sighing. He did have vague memories of Merlin force-feeding him paracetamol and a glass of water at some point during the previous night, which he supposed ought to count for something. He closed his eyes. Merlin’s fingers in his hair felt _so good_. “I was a dick.”

 

“You were,” Merlin said matter-of-factly. “And on top of that you decided to be an idiot as well. Do you know how close I came to calling an ambulance last night? Not to mention, when Gwen called me from your phone I nearly had a heart attack. I thought you must be lying dead in a ditch somewhere—you _never_ let people use your phone.” 

 

“Sorry,” Arthur said again. There was a long silence while he listened to Merlin’s breathing and tried to come up with an explanation for his outburst that _didn’t_ make him sound completely pathetic. “I didn’t mean to worry you.” 

 

“Well, you did.” He felt the mattress dip as Merlin settled down onto the bed. “What the hell is going on with you lately? I know you don't like Gwaine, but you’ve been acting strange for a couple of weeks now." He paused, then said more softly, “Are you okay?”

 

Arthur groaned unintelligibly into the bedcovers, and he heard Merlin laugh.

 

“I’ll take that as a maybe,” he said. His hand stopped at Arthur’s nape, fingers trailing warm and soft against the sensitive skin, and Arthur felt his dick stir vaguely where it was pressed against the mattress. He let out another garbled sound and buried his face in his pillow. Fuck, first he’d failed miserably at getting laid the night before, and now Merlin was turning him on. Why couldn’t his body make up its mind? 

 

“Arthur?” Merlin said tentatively. It was the voice he used when he was about to say something serious, and in spite of himself Arthur turned to look at him, struggling to focus even though his head was throbbing. “According to Gwen, you were this close to giving yourself alcohol poisoning last night. At the _very least_ ,” he stressed, when Arthur made a dissenting sound. “And that woman—Sophie?—Gwen said she kept egging you on, like she thought it was funny.” His face did a strange twisty thing then, and Arthur realised he was furious, though he was fairly sure it wasn’t directed at him. “I don’t know how much of that was true, but I do know this isn't like you. And I know I said that we needed to break up and everything, but you’re still my best friend, so if all this is because you’re pining for Vivian, or pissed off at your dad, or…whatever.” He waved a hand. “You can _always_ talk to me. Okay? Just—don’t do that again. Please.”

 

Arthur stared at him for a long moment, taking in the painfully earnest face, the sooty lashes, the elegant divot of Merlin’s lips, still slightly parted. He really didn’t like to think of himself as one of those people who needed to have some kind of personal crisis before they could see what was right in front of them, and part of him wondered if he might not still be a little bit drunk, but all at once it occurred to him that he _was_ pining for someone after all. Had been for quite a while, in fact. 

 

And it wasn’t Vivian. 

 


	5. Chapter 5

Gwen came around the next morning, bringing with her a chocolate cake and what seemed to Arthur to be an excess of concern for his wellbeing. Apparently, she and Merlin had really bonded after her heroics the day before, although you wouldn’t have known it by the way Merlin kept his head down and hardly contributed at all to the conversation. This left Arthur to pick up the slack, which was awkward, since Gwen seemed to be under the impression that he was a borderline alcoholic and kept trying to warn him about the dangers of addiction and drinking to excess. Apparently, her brother was an EMT.

“And he sees so many young people drinking and putting themselves in harm's way,” Gwen said earnestly, her dark eyes painfully sincere. “He’s told me the most terrible stories. So I just wanted to make sure that you’re okay.”

“I’m fine,” Arthur assured her, trying not to sound as wrong-footed as he felt. “Really, thank you. I was just having a bad night. Besides, Merlin already read me the riot act, didn’t you, Merlin?”

He nudged Merlin, who smiled and nodded and _completely failed to engage in the conversation_. Arthur wanted to strangle him.

“Okay, seriously, what the hell?” Arthur hissed when Gwen had finally gone. “Is today opposite day, or did some evil genius sneak in here in the night and make off with your personality? _You’re_ supposed to be the outgoing and gregarious one in this friendship, not me!”

Merlin sighed. “I’m sorry,” he said, picking at the sofa cushions. “I didn’t mean to be rude. I just wasn’t expecting her to show up like that, that’s all.”

Arthur narrowed his eyes, unconvinced. Merlin loved company, unexpected or not, and this sort of shy, withdrawn behaviour was not like him. Arthur’s best-friend senses were tingling.

“All right, what’s going on?” he said, grabbing Merlin’s hand to stop him from picking the cushion to pieces. He tried not to notice how warm and comfortable it felt in his—had they always fit together so well like that?—and instead gave it a little shake. “First you take the day off work to take care of me—which I appreciate, by the way, but let me reiterate: I am _not dying_ —and now you don’t feel like talking to Gwen, who is perfectly nice, even if she does have terrible taste in friends. The last time you were this unresponsive in company your mum had to call the ambulance because you were going into anaphylactic shock. So I repeat: what’s going on?”

“I’m fine.”

“You are _not_ fine,” Arthur said, quite firmly. “And if you don’t tell me why not so that I can fix it, I am going to go through this entire flat and get rid of every box of that ridiculous cereal that I can find, so help me God. You know I will,” he added, when Merlin looked at him with wide eyes. “So what’s it going to be?”

The two of them stared at one another for a long time, until finally Merlin sighed and dropped his gaze.

“Gwaine broke up with me,” he mumbled, looking at his knees. “Before he left. We’re not going to be seeing each other anymore.”

If Arthur had ever harboured any doubts about whether his feelings for Merlin were indeed romantic in nature, they would have been obliterated by the effect of that simple sentence. His stomach was doing cartwheels, his heart dancing what was possibly a samba in the middle of his chest, and he was giving serious consideration to jumping up and imitating it right there on the living room floor. “Oh,” he said, his mouth going dry. “I’m sorry.” Which was a bald-faced lie, although he _was_ sorry that Merlin was so upset. “I’ll make sure to insult his hair for you the next time I see him.” Which wasn’t a lie at all, although fortunately for Gwaine the degree to which he irritated Arthur had been reduced considerably now that he and Merlin were no longer dating. 

Merlin shot him a tiny smile. “It’s fine, really,” he said. “I mean, he was dead nice about it and everything, so no insults required. I’m just a bit sad and I didn’t really feel up to doing the whole company thing. I’m sorry if I got in the way of you and Gwen—” he gestured. “You know.”

“Having a conversation?” Arthur hazarded. “Being incredibly awkward with one another for a full twenty minutes?”

Merlin rolled his eyes. “ _Getting along_ ,” he said meaningfully, and Arthur snorted.

“She gave me an AA pamphlet,” he said, holding up the offending material so that Merlin could see it. “And the first time we met, I threw up on her shoes. I’m pretty sure she doesn’t want to date me.”

“The first time we met, you dropped a giant water-balloon on my head and ruined my biology homework,” Merlin pointed out. “If I can get over that, I’m sure Gwen won’t care about a measly pair of shoes.”

Arthur just shook his head and smiled, remembering the way Merlin had looked with his hair all wet and spiky like an angry cat. That had been a good day. “Whatever you say, Merlin,” he said, patting Merlin’s head in the patronising way he knew Merlin hated. “Whatever you say.”

*

To Arthur’s unspeakable relief, with Gwaine out of the picture things with Merlin gradually began to get back to normal. Merlin was still uncharacteristically quiet at times, and occasionally Arthur caught him staring into space with a wistful expression, as though he were thinking back on better days, but there was no one to derail their curry nights anymore, and if Arthur felt compelled to flop on top of Merlin and crush him into the sofa cushions until he squeaked, he was free to do so without any annoying houseguests getting in the way.

The only real difference, now that Arthur finally understood his feelings, was that it was becoming increasingly difficult for him not to want _more_. When Merlin hid his face in Arthur’s shoulder during scary movies (which for Merlin meant anything involving violence or the possibility that the dog might die), Arthur had to fight the urge to do something stupid like kiss him to death or bury his nose in Merlin’s hair; when Merlin dumped All Bran over Arthur’s head one morning because he had hidden the rest of the cereal, Arthur’s only response— _after_ laughing himself stupid, of course—was to sigh indulgently at the way Merlin’s eyes had flashed a particularly brilliant shade of blue. Merlin had retaliated for that little prank by replacing Arthur’s favourite apricot jam with marmalade, and even while he was busy retching dramatically over the kitchen sink and swearing eternal revenge, Arthur had been conscious of a desire to kiss the smug grin right off Merlin’s smugly grinning face.

All in all, things were beginning to get out of hand.

“Why don’t you just, you know, tell him?” Gwen suggested, when the two of them were having lunch together some weeks later. They had discovered a few days after the Great Gwaine Debacle that Gwen worked just down the street from Arthur’s building, and once Arthur had persuaded her—by dint of a drinking contest down at the Rising Sun, which in retrospect probably hadn’t been the brightest idea—that he was largely a social drinker and wasn’t actually in need of counselling, they had struck up a surprisingly comfortable friendship. It helped that Gwen was also bi and currently pining after her roommate, Sefa, so they had at least that much in common. “You never know, maybe he’ll be open to the idea.”

“He was the one who wanted to break up with me, remember?” Arthur said morosely, stabbing at his salad with a fork. “And we weren’t even dating then. God knows what he’d say if he realised I actually have feelings for him.”

Gwen gave him a commiserating smile and squeezed his free hand across the table. “You’ll never know until you try,” she said, clearly trying to sound encouraging. “It took you forever to realise how you feel about him, right? Maybe all Merlin needs is the opportunity to do the same.”

“Yeah, maybe.” Arthur shrugged, not really convinced. “And maybe we’ll all wake up tomorrow to see a herd of pigs flying over London.”

Gwen raised her coffee cup and clinked it against his in a somewhat dismal salute. “I’ll drink to that,” she said. “Responsibly,” she added, just in case that needed to be clarified.

*

Arthur did _try_ to do as Gwen had recommended and ask Merlin out on a proper date. The problem was, whatever he suggested—be it dinner, or a movie, or a quasi-romantic evening stroll with just the two of them—it wasn’t all that different from the sort of thing they did together anyway, which meant that Merlin generally failed to understand Arthur’s intentions. Short of beaning him over the head with a sign saying I AM HOPELESSLY IN LOVE WITH YOU, Arthur couldn’t think of a way to enlighten him that didn’t involve the risk of expiring from terminal embarrassment, so Merlin continued to remain oblivious and Arthur continued to pine over him from not so far away, feeling ridiculous but also increasingly frustrated. He was beginning to see Merlin’s point about the two of them having been dating this whole time without realising it.

Finally, opportunity arrived in the form of an email, inviting Arthur and a plus one to one of Pendragon & Faye's gala events at the National Portrait Gallery. Uther was always passing such requests on to his son, largely in an attempt to prove to him how much more profitable his life could be if he would only turn to practicing Corporate Law instead, and Arthur usually found them to be something of an annoyance, but in this case, he was hit with a sudden brainwave. Merlin liked art. Arthur liked Merlin. Surely putting the two things together would be bound to result in a happy ending for everyone involved.

Marching into the living room, Arthur dropped his computer onto Merlin’s lap and tapped at the email on the screen, saying as casually as he could, “Will you come with me?”

"Hmm?" Merlin frowned at him, muting the television. “What was that?”

“To my father’s work party.” Arthur’s heart was pounding, and he wasn’t sure he’d be able to force the words out past the sudden constriction in his throat. “The invitation says plus one. Will you come with me?”

“You want a fake date to your dad’s work party?” Merlin asked, sounding confused. “You don’t even work there, it’s not like you need to impress anyone. Why can’t you just take Gwen?”

“First of all, I told you, Gwen and I are just friends, and I really don't need her to come along and judge all of my terrible life choices. And second of all, no, I don’t want a fake date to a fake work party,” Arthur took a deep breath, “I want a real date. With you.”

The silence that followed was so complete, Arthur almost thought he could hear the blood pulsing erratically through his veins. Merlin’s incomprehension gradually morphed into outright shock, his mouth hanging slightly open, and he was staring at Arthur as though he’d just grown a second head.

“You…” he said faintly, sliding the laptop heedlessly off his knees as he sat up. “I don’t know what to say.”

“I believe either yes or no would be the traditional response.”

“But—we broke up!” Merlin flailed his hands. “You—there was a divorce and everything!”

“I think you’ll find that it’s impossible to break up when you are _not actually dating_ ,” Arthur said, because honestly, he shouldn’t have to keep repeating that fact. “And now that we’ve been broken up for a while, I think…well. I missed you. A lot.”

“I missed you too,” Merlin said, still sounding shell-shocked. “But it’s not like we stopped being friends, or anything. You don’t need to _date_ me just to spend time with me.”

“You went to see _Star Wars_ without me,” Arthur pointed out, since this was still something of a sore spot for him. “Twice. If that’s not the very definition of non-friend-like behaviour, I don’t know what is.”

Merlin had the grace to look somewhat abashed at the reminder, although that didn’t stop him from arguing the point.

 

“I told you I was sorry about that,” he said. “I even offered to make it up to you by letting you see _Solo_ first and tell me all the spoilers. You said I didn’t need to!”

“Well, I lied,” Arthur said, unrepentant. “I take it back. You can make it up to me by coming to my father’s horrendously boring work party. As my date.”

Merlin squinted at him, obviously suspicious. “Seriously?” he asked. “You’re not taking the piss?”

“Seriously,” Arthur said, and tried to arrange his features into his most sober, serious expression. Merlin studied him for a few minutes longer, but apparently he judged that Arthur was telling the truth, because eventually he nodded.

“Okay,” he said, a slow smile breaking over his face. “Since you asked so nicely, then—yes, I will go to your father’s horrendously boring work party with you.” The smile gave way to a familiar grin that really was far too adorable for Arthur’s peace of mind, and he added, “I guess that means you can consider us officially un-broken-up.”

 

Arthur refrained from punching the air until he had actually left the room, but it was definitely a very close thing. 


	6. Chapter 6

 

“Are you ready yet?” Arthur called through Merlin’s closed door, shifting from foot to foot in his impatience. He had a box of chocolates clutched in one hand and a small boutonniere of white roses in the other, having been unable to decide which was the more appropriate gift, and his hands were growing sweaty as he waited for Merlin to emerge from his room. “What are you even doing in there, sewing your outfit by hand?”

 

“I’m getting _dressed_ , Arthur,” Merlin said, sounding grumpy as at long last he tugged open the door. “I’ll have you know that this suit takes forever to put on—all these stupid buttons—”

 

He stopped, blinking a little as he took in Arthur’s outfit. Arthur couldn’t imagine why—it wasn’t that much different from what he ordinarily wore to work—but something about it brought a pink flush to Merlin’s cheeks that was unfairly attractive.

 

“You look,” Merlin said, swallowing. “You look nice.”

 

“Thanks.” Arthur realised he was grinning, and tried to tone down his expression. “So do you. Oh, and these are for you.” He held out the chocolates and flowers. “I couldn’t decide which would be better, so I got both.”

 

“Both is good,” Merlin replied, nodding absently. He accepted the roses first, staring at them as though he’d never actually seen a flower before, and fumblingly attached them to his buttonhole. He was wearing a carefully pressed navy suit that Arthur had never seen before, an elegant cross between formal business attire and genuine black tie. It was a little big at the shoulders and hips, which led Arthur to suspect he might have borrowed it from someone, but the colour was intense and brought out his eyes so beautifully that the rest was barely noticeable. “And—you got my favourites!”

 

“Of course,” Arthur said, feeling oddly shy. “No point in getting you chocolates if they don’t have the coconut ones. I know how much you love to complain about them.” He smirked. “Besides, that way I can be sure you’ll save a few for me.”

 

They beamed at each other for a moment, before Merlin seemed to realise they had somewhere to be and cleared his throat, sneaking another glance at Arthur through his lashes. “Right. Well, let’s get going, then, shall we? You know what your father is like about punctuality.”

 

“Yes! Yes, of course, good idea,” Arthur agreed, and the two of them promptly held a fierce but silent competition over who got to open the door for whom, which Arthur won. Merlin swept ahead of him into the hallway, laughing, and Arthur took advantage of the moment to pinch his bum as he went by. So far, so good.

 

Down in the cab, however, Merlin seemed to become unaccountably restless. He began shifting a little in his seat, staring out the window and tugging at his collar as though his tie had suddenly become too tight. Arthur watched him for a few moments, puzzled, then leaned over and asked quietly, “Are you all right?”

 

Merlin nodded, distracted. “Fine. I’m f—” He sneezed loudly. “I’b fide.”

 

“Okay.” Arthur eyed him, not convinced. He had seen that look before. He put the back of his hand to Merlin’s forehead, finding it hot and sweaty, and thumbed on the flashlight app on his phone to see what he had suspected: a patch of large, angry-looking welts was spreading across Merlin’s pale skin. “So, the hives would be a deliberate fashion statement, then?” he asked, brushing one with his finger. “That’s a bold look for the evening, Merlin, but not one I would really recommend. Did you change your washing powder again?”

 

Merlin scratched at his neck again, looking chagrined. “No, it’s not that,” he said. “I’m sorry, Arthur. I really didn’t think it would be a problem. It’s just—sometimes with flowers—”

 

“Oh! Oh no, I’m sorry.” Pulling him forward, Arthur leaned over and unfastened the corsage from his collar, feeling the warmth of Merlin’s skin through the material beneath his fingers. When he was done, he rolled down the window and chucked the whole thing out onto the street, twenty quid be damned. “I didn’t know you were allergic.”

 

“I’m not, usually.” Merlin shrugged. “It happened once at my Auntie Muriel’s wedding, when I was about three. Since then it’s never really been an issue.”

 

Arthur rolled his eyes. Of course it had never been an issue. It wasn’t like Merlin hung out in flowerbeds very often, and Arthur would have known if this particular allergy had come up before; ever since the horrible night of Merlin’s seventeenth birthday party, which he and Merlin’s mother had spent frightened out of their wits in the Emergency Department thanks to a misplaced cashew nut, he had compiled a list of Merlin-related allergens to avoid and he stuck to it religiously. Merlin was allergic to several very specific and hideously ubiquitous things, yet he had the self-preservation instincts of a particularly persistent gnat, which meant that Arthur often had to intervene to prevent him from getting himself killed through sheer personal negligence.

 

“Do you want to go back?” he asked now, his stomach sinking at the prospective ruin of all his plans. “We can turn around and just spend the night in, if you’d rather.”

 

“What? No! It’s not a big deal.” Merlin said, though he was still scratching miserably. “If it’s any consolation, I really do appreciate the gesture. No one has ever bought me flowers before.”

 

“You’re welcome,” Arthur said, forcing himself to smile. “I’m only sorry they made you sick, is all.”

 

“That’s not your fault.” Merlin slipped his free hand into Arthur’s, giving it a reassuring squeeze, and Arthur squeezed helplessly back, his heart skipping a beat. Perhaps the evening would end up being successful after all.

 

 

*

 

 

As if the roses had been an omen, however, their date did not improve from there. Merlin left for the bathroom as soon as they arrived, murmuring something about cold compresses and getting rid of his hives before venturing into company, which left Arthur to suffer his way through Uther’s greeting alone. He didn’t exactly _hate_ his father—Uther was cold and often distant, but never outright cruel—it was just that he couldn’t help feeling as if he’d shrunk at least a foot in height whenever they were in the same room together.

 

“And how is that case you’re working on going, Arthur?” Uther asked benignly, shaking his son’s hand. It was a bit like being introduced to the Prime Minister. “Drunk driver, wasn’t it? You must be working hard.”

 

“It was a hit-and-run case, actually,” Arthur said through gritted teeth. “A nasty one. And yes, I have been working hard. In fact—”

 

But his father’s attention had already been caught by one of his fellow associates, and the rest of Arthur’s sentence was ignored in favour of making introductions. Uther didn’t seem to notice that his son had been interrupted, nor did he express any further interest in hearing about Arthur’s life—professional or otherwise—so Arthur made his excuses shortly afterwards, feeling as if he had once more reverted to a six year old kid desperate for his father’s approval.

 

Fortunately, he spotted Gwen a few minutes later, and made a beeline for her across the crowded room, snagging an hors d’oeuvre from one of the waiters on his way. Gwen was looking very pretty in a floor-length lavender gown, her hair swept back from her face with a sparkling silver clip. On the surface, she fit right in with the rest of the glitzy crowd, but the nervous way she was wringing her gloved hands in front of her lap suggested that she wasn’t as confident of her place as she appeared.

 

“Arthur!” she said, beaming when she caught sight of him. “What are you doing here?”

 

Arthur leaned in to kiss her cheek. “My father,” he explained, gesturing at where Uther was now entertaining a handful of businessmen. “His firm is the one hosting the party.”

 

“Oh, of course.” Gwen shook her head. “I can’t believe I didn’t realise—Pendragon and Faye—and you’re _Arthur_ Pendragon—”

 

“And what about you?” Arthur asked, interrupting smoothly before she could start babbling about his family. He took a bite of his hors d’oeuvre, thankful that he hadn’t gone for a glass of champagne instead. He wasn’t in the mood for a temperance lecture right now. “I didn’t expect to see you here.”

 

“Sefa invited me,” Gwen said with a shy smile. “She runs a catering company, and, well—she’s actually the one who organised the event.”

 

“Ah, I see!” Arthur smiled back. “So, I take it things are going well, then?”

 

“I think so.” Gwen’s blush deepened, making her look even prettier, and her eyes sparkled. “I mean, I don’t want to assume, of course, but she did ask me to be her plus one and that’s practically a date, isn’t it? And everything has turned out so well—I’ve never seen her so excited, all the dresses and the _food_ —and then earlier I could have sworn that she was going to kiss me, except we were interrupted, but she promised she’d come and find me to pick up where we left off, only she never specified what that meant and now I just don’t know—”

 

“Breathe, Gwen,” Arthur said, watching with amusement as she plucked a glass from one of the nearby tables and downed it in one gulp. “And what happened to drinking responsibly?”

 

“I am drinking responsibly,” Gwen said, her tone bordering on hysterical. “If I don’t calm down, I might spontaneously combust and ruin Sefa’s wonderful party.”

 

“Well, we wouldn’t want that,” Arthur agreed, laughing, and saluted her with the remains of his crab puff.

 

 

*

 

 

It seemed to take an age before Merlin returned, looking dishevelled and slightly damp but having otherwise recovered from his reaction to the roses. Arthur seized upon him at once, dragging him over to see Gwen, whom he once again greeted with an un-Merlin-like degree of reserve. Gwen seemed to take it in stride, however, or perhaps she was just too buzzed on adrenaline (and multiple glasses of expensive champagne) to notice Merlin’s less-than-enthusiastic greeting.

 

Since Sefa was still otherwise engaged, the three of them spent some time wandering through thegallery, checking out the portraits and mingling with the other guests. Arthur took great pleasure in introducing Merlin to everyone as his date and making sure to be on his best behaviour, which seemed to entertain Gwen to no end—every time Arthur said or did something gallant, he caught her smiling at him over her glass as if he were a particularly adorable toddler doing something particularly, well, adorable.

 

Merlin, by contrast, grew more and more subdued as the evening wore on. Arthur liked to think that he was well attuned to his best friend’s moods by now, and his inner Merlin-barometer was hinting at some heavy weather ahead. What he couldn’t figure out was why. Merlin’s hives had all but disappeared, and he appeared to have enjoyed looking at the paintings, joining in with Arthur and Gwen when they began to speculate on the history and personalities of the people whose faces had been immortalised on canvas. And yet, something was off—Arthur didn’t think he was imagining the way that Merlin’s amused smile and friendly laughter didn’t quite reach his eyes.

 

“All right, seriously, what is it?” Arthur asked, once Gwen had excused herself to go powder her nose. “Did you eat one of the crab puffs by mistake? Are you feeling ill? I can call Dr Gaius right now if you need to—”

 

“I’m fine,” Merlin said, and he sounded irritated. “Would you stop already?”

 

“I’m just trying to look out for you,” Arthur said. “You know you can’t always trust the food at these things to be allergen-free.”

 

“Yes, thank you, I’m aware,” Merlin said. He was scowling. “I’ve been dealing with allergies my entire life, which is how I know for an absolute certainty that _I am fine_. Or I would be, if you’d just leave me alone.”

 

Stung, Arthur took a step back, letting his hand drop from where it had been resting on Merlin's arm. “I’m sorry,” he said, voice turning stiff. “Excuse me for trying to make sure you’re not going to keel over and die in the middle of the National Portrait Gallery.”

 

“Oh, is _that_ what this is about?”

 

“Yes?” Arthur stared at him. “What _else_ would I be doing?”

 

“Hmm, I don’t know. Showing off for Gwen?” Merlin folded his arms, gaze narrowing. “Since she’s the one you haven't been able to keep your eyes off all evening.”

 

Arthur let out an incredulous laugh. “Are you _jealous_?” he asked, unsure whether to be amused or flattered at the thought. He’d never known Merlin to be particularly possessive before. “Merlin, Gwen came here with Sefa. Her roommate. As far as I know, the two of them are head-over-heels for one another.”

 

“So is that why you invited me, then? Because Gwen already had a date?”

“ _What_?” Arthur blinked. “Of course not. I told you—”

 

But Merlin was holding up a hand, shaking his head. “No, you’re right, I’m sorry,” he said. “I know you wouldn’t do that. I just…Christ, Arthur, you asked me if I needed a jacket _twelve times_ , just because you saw me shiver once!”

 

“I thought you might be cold,” Arthur said, confused. Merlin lifted his eyes to the ceiling.

 

“That’s exactly what I mean. You never care about my temperature usually! You always make fun of me for my bad circulation and general lack of physical stamina, and then you give me your jacket or something and threaten to put your socks over my ears. And yet, now…” He trailed off, chewing on his lower lip. “This isn’t us. I don’t know what it is, but it isn’t—something isn’t _right_. Surely you can see that.”

 

“Right,” Arthur echoed. His lips felt numb, and he could swear that his throat was closing up—he wondered if allergies were contagious. “You think something isn't _right_ about the two of us going out on a date?”

 

“I don’t _know_ ,” Merlin said, and his expression was wretched. “It just…it feels more like you’re playing a role tonight than it did when you were actually pretending to be my boyfriend. And I think—yeah. Maybe this _isn't_ right. Maybe we'd have been better off leaving things the way they were."

 

The guests around them talked on, and dimly Arthur was aware that there was music playing, but he couldn’t seem to hear it. He felt like he was going to throw up—or worse. Perhaps there _had_ been something wrong with the crab puffs.

 

“Arthur? Arthur, would you please say something?”

 

“Right,” Arthur said again, turning blindly in the direction of the gallery’s double doors. He didn’t check to see if Merlin was following him. “Well, I suppose that’s that, then.”

 

 

*

 

 

The cab-ride home was silent, both of them too upset and exhausted to try to make conversation. Arthur stared blankly out of the window, his ears still ringing with Merlin’s final words. He had been trying so hard to make tonight perfect, and yet everything he’d done had been an utter disaster, from the ridiculous corsage to the equally ridiculous party. No wonder Merlin had hated every minute of it.

 

When they got back to the flat, Arthur paid the driver and followed Merlin up the stairs, neither of them saying a word as they divested themselves of their coats and hats and toed off their shoes in the foyer. It was Merlin’s custom to wind down after a long day with a bowl of cereal in the kitchen, so Arthur headed down the hallway in the opposite direction, intent on crawling under the covers and forgetting this whole, stupid evening had ever happened.

 

“Arthur.” Merlin caught his arm, making him stop. “I—about tonight…”

 

His formerly crisp blue suit was rumpled, and at some point during the evening the product had worn out of his hair, leaving it dishevelled and vaguely spiky where he had run his hands through it. He looked sad and a little lost, two things that happy-go-lucky Merlin should never be, and Arthur felt his anger dissolving in spite of himself. “It’s fine, Merlin,” he said tiredly, disentangling himself gently from Merlin's grasp. “Let’s just—get some sleep, all right? We can talk about it in the morning.”

 

It was the best that he could offer, and Merlin seemed to know that, because he nodded, although he still looked like a hot air balloon that had just developed a puncture. “Okay,” he said softly. “Good night, Arthur.”

 

“Good night, Merlin.”

 


	7. Chapter 7

 

The longest Arthur and Merlin had ever gone without speaking to one another was eight hours, twelve minutes, and twenty-seven seconds, back at the beginning of their first year at university. They had still been close, even then, but between the pressure of passing their classes and the fact that they were now sharing a room for the first time ever, their closeness had turned into something suffocating. Tempers had frayed, words had been said, and the resulting argument had seen Merlin banished to Will’s dorm-room overnight until they both calmed down, something that had never happened before in the entire course of their friendship. At the time, Arthur had considered it the most miserable he had ever been, and Merlin had sworn it shaved years off his life, so they had both of them vowed never to let anything drive them apart like that again—which it hadn’t.

 

Until now.

 

Despite his tiredness, Arthur found it impossible to sleep. He tossed and turned for what felt like an age, replaying the disastrous evening over in his head, trying to pinpoint the exact moment when everything had gone to hell. He loved Merlin. Had probably always loved him, one way or another. Up until a few short hours ago, he had been certain they were destined to be together until they were old and grey, if not as lovers then at least as friends—and as far as he could tell, Merlin had thought the same. So how exactly had everything gone so wrong?

 

Usually, when Arthur messed up with someone like this, he would go to Merlin for advice, but that wasn't going to work this time, for obvious reasons. He tried to think what someone without a best friend would do in his situation, but couldn't, and that just made him feel even worse. What if he'd screwed things up so badly that Merlin never spoke to him again? What was he supposed to do then? He punched his pillow and turned over yet again, flopping onto his stomach on the bed. It wasn't as if he had done anything particularly heinous, anyway. He could name at least five things off the top of his head that were worse than being excessively concerned about someone's well-being, most of which he did on a regular basis. Clearly, Merlin was being ridiculous. This was all his fault. 

 

On the other hand, it wouldn't exactly be the first time Arthur had put his foot in it on the first date. He had thought dating Merlin would be easy; the two of them had known one another for years, knew each other's quirks and foibles, their likes and dislikes and stupid allergies. Hell, most people thought they were together already. But clearly he had miscalculated _somewhere_ , since otherwise Merlin wouldn't have gotten so upset, and the fact that Arthur didn't understand why was unusual enough in itself to merit serious consideration. 

 

It was coming up on five hours since they had argued, and a little less than that since they'd said good night in the hall, when Arthur heard the hinges of his door creak as someone pushed it open.

 

“Arthur?” Merlin whispered out of the darkness. Arthur looked over to find him hovering in the doorway, apparently uncertain whether or not to come in. “Are you awake?”

 

“No, I’m sleeping,” Arthur grumbled, giving lie to the statement immediately by rolling over to face him. Merlin looked just the same as ever, but it felt like so long since Arthur had seen him that he couldn't help staring anyway, taking in the familiar _Harry Potter_ pyjamas and the tousled mop of hair. “What are you doing here?”

 

“Couldn’t sleep.” Merlin padded across the floor, and after a brief hesitation he slid under the covers beside Arthur, shoving him over to make room the way he used to when they were kids. Arthur chuntered a bit under his breath, but shifted anyway, and Merlin curled up so that his back was pressed against Arthur’s chest. “I hate fighting with you.”

 

“Me too,” Arthur admitted, since there was no point in pretending otherwise. He kicked gently at Merlin's foot. “I’m sorry.”

 

“I’m sorry, too.”

 

There wasn’t much room in the bed, even though it was technically a double, so Arthur breathed very carefully and tried not to take up too much space, one hand settling onto Merlin’s hip and the other squashed painfully between them. It wasn’t exactly the most comfortable position in the world, but it was so rare for the two of them to share physical space like this— _really_ share it, not just harass one another for the sake of it—that he didn’t want to disturb the moment with such petty concerns as pins and needles. That, and he wasn't certain how much leeway he would be allowed, anymore; he could feel Merlin turning things over in his mind, but he didn't know whether that meant he had reconsidered his words from before, or if this was some kind of heartbreaking prelude to ending their friendship for good.

 

“So I’ve been thinking,” Merlin said after a while, his voice slightly muffled where his face was mashed into Arthur’s pillow. “Maybe we kind of went about this the wrong way.”

 

“Yeah?” Arthur tried to sound casual. "How so?"

 

“Well, I mean, we were _already_ dating, right? Before you had that thing with Vivian and I started going out with Gwaine in an attempt to prove that I didn’t have feelings for you.”

 

“That’s a matter of opinion,” Arthur said, although privately he was pretty sure by now that they had been dating since they were in high school. And— “Wait, _that’s_ why you were going out with Gwaine? Because you thought you had feelings for me?”

 

Merlin let out a long-suffering sigh. “ _Yes_ , Arthur, do try to keep up.” When Arthur poked him vengefully in the side, he snorted and went on, “So I thought, if we were already dating, maybe going out on an actual date was—kind of a step backwards.”

 

“Huh.” When he put it that way, Arthur could almost see his point. “I guess that kind of makes sense. Maybe.”

 

“Yeah.” Merlin was silent for a moment, then he reached back and squeezed Arthur’s hand the way he had done in the cab, threading their fingers together. Arthur held on tightly. “It’s not that I didn’t enjoy tonight,” he said. “I mean, it was kind of funny watching you try so hard to be the perfect boyfriend for an evening. I’m pretty sure you would have taken off your coat and spread it over a puddle for me if I’d asked you to.”

 

Arthur huffed, although he didn’t deny it. “I was being polite.”

 

“ _Very_ polite. It was eerie. And it kind of felt like you were making fun of me.” Merlin’s voice grew quieter, almost embarrassed, and Arthur’s grip tightened. “That first time, when we were trying to fool Cenred, part of the reason I was acting so weird was because I realised how much I liked it. Being with you, like that. I’d never really thought about it all that much before, and then suddenly it was all I could think about. Only you didn’t seem to notice at all.”

 

Oh. _Oh_. Arthur thought back to the day he had asked Merlin to his father’s party— _you’re not taking the piss?_ And before that, when Merlin had interrogated him on the ride home from his work do, demanding to know whether Arthur had thought it was strange the way everyone always assumed they were together. No wonder he had been so put out when Arthur finally asked him on a date, only to go to such elaborate lengths to be someone other than himself all evening. It must have seemed like he really was just pretending—or worse, that he was using Merlin and his feelings in an attempt to make Gwen jealous.

 

“I just wanted you to be happy."

 

“I know. I figured that much out already.” Merlin tugged at Arthur’s arm, pulling it further around his chest. “But this— _this_ is what makes me happy, Arthur. Being with you, not your evil Stepford clone.”

 

Arthur couldn’t help grinning at that, so he buried his face in the back of Merlin’s neck to hide it and said nothing, wondering if it were possible to explode from feeling so many different things at once. Merlin waited patiently; he had always known when to give Arthur time to process his thoughts.

 

“Fine,” Arthur said at length, when the storm of emotion had passed and he could talk again. “No more Stepford Arthur. But if you don’t think actual dating is actually necessary, then what exactly are we supposed to do instead?”

 

In response, Merlin mumbled something unintelligible into the pillow, and Arthur poked him again, annoyed. “What was that?”

 

“I _said_ , maybe we should have gone straight to the kissing part,” Merlin said, jabbing Arthur in the stomach with his elbow. The words came out all rushed together, and it took a moment for Arthur to understand what he was saying. “Possibly. If you wanted. I mean, I wouldn’t have been averse.”

 

Arthur didn’t say anything. Merlin made it all sound so simple, as if Arthur could have just leaned over and kissed him at any moment and he would have gone along with it. Maybe he would have. Maybe the root of the problem here wasn’t just that Merlin had been insecure about how Arthur felt, but also that _Arthur_ was insecure about how _Merlin_ felt, and so he had overcompensated. After all, Merlin had never been the sort of bloke who went in for chocolates and flowers—that was what he did for Arthur when he wanted to bribe him into doing his nefarious bidding. For himself, Merlin preferred different, more personal displays of affection, like hiding his goddamn cereal every morning, or teasing him about his ears, or—

 

Fuck. Arthur had been so stupid.

 

“Arthur?” Merlin rolled over so that they were face to face, a small frown creasing his forehead. “Hey, it’s fine if you don’t want to. I just thought, maybe we were trying to make this into a _thing_ , you know? When it doesn’t have to be a thing, because it’s already…thing-like. So maybe the thing it should actually be got confused with the thing we thought it was, when that wasn’t the thing that ultimately made sense, so—”

 

“Merlin?” Arthur said, interrupting him with a finger over his mouth. “Shut up. I’m trying to think.”

 

Merlin fell silent at once, although Arthur could practically _feel_ the effort it cost him not to make his usual snarky retort. Pressed up close together like this, alone in his dark bedroom where it was just them and Arthur had nothing left to prove, it seemed like the easiest step in the world to acknowledge that this was what he had wanted all along. Just Merlin being Merlin, only preferably with added kissing and maybe a bit of sex thrown in.

 

“I’m going to kiss you now,” he said finally, making up his mind. “Okay?”

 

Merlin nodded frantically, and Arthur took his hand away, his heart pounding as he levered himself up onto one elbow. For a second, he looked down into Merlin’s face, noting the slightly parted lips and searching eyes. Then Merlin smiled up at him tentatively, looking nervous as all hell but also quite determined, and Arthur couldn’t help smiling back as he moved in and pressed their mouths together.

 

He could taste the remnants of last night’s chocolates on Merlin’s tongue, buried beneath the pepperminty flavour of his toothpaste; that was the first thing he noticed. The second thing was that Merlin had nice lips, soft and plump and perfectly shaped, and that those lips were doing very nice things to his lips and indirectly to various other parts of his body, and that he wanted to keep on kissing Merlin forever, if such a thing were possible, never mind such pesky insignificant details as the need for food and air.

 

“Oh,” Arthur said, when they broke apart. He felt like there should be words for the experience, somehow, but he wasn’t sure exactly what they were. “So that was…”

 

“Yeah,” Merlin agreed, his eyes crinkling fondly.“Now, maybe if you’d led with that yesterday, we’d have figured things out a lot sooner.” He smirked. “Although, I would have been sorry to have missed the corsage.”

 

“It was too much, wasn’t it?” Arthur winced. "You should have told me it was too much.”

 

“Eh, I don’t know. I might have enjoyed it a little.” Merlin shrugged off-handedly, and when Arthur shot him an incredulous look, his smile broadened. “It was kind of sweet.”

 

“It gave you hives!”

 

“I know. But it was a thoughtful gesture.” He stroked the line of Arthur’s jaw with his thumb, coaxing out the dimple in his cheek. “It’s no wonder you freaked me out so much, you know—you’re never that nice to me usually.”

 

“Oh, really?” Arthur pushed him over onto his back, straddling his waist so that Merlin couldn’t escape, and loomed over him. “I’ll show you _nice_ ,” he threatened, and proceeded to kiss Merlin all over his face, sliding his hands up under Merlin’s shirt to tickle at his ribs and under his armpits—all the spots he knew that Merlin was most sensitive. Merlin squeaked and tried to squirm away, but not very effectively, and Arthur took that as permission to continue, kissing and stroking him until he was a writhing, giggling mess.

 

“All right, all right, I give,” Merlin conceded finally, sounding breathless, and Arthur reluctantly let him go. “You’re a nice, very nice, wonderful person, not a terrible prat, gosh, what was I thinking.”

 

“It’s about time you figured that out,” said Arthur solemnly, reaching down and brushing a strand of hair out of Merlin’s eyes. “I was beginning to think you didn’t know me at all.”

 


	8. Chapter 8

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> With many thanks to AP for checking this chapter over for me! <3

 

Arthur would have been fine with it if they had stopped at kissing for the night—or at least, that was what he told himself, unwilling to press his luck now that things were finally progressing in the right direction. Merlin, however, seemed to have no such qualms, hooking his arms around Arthur’s neck and murmuring, “Wanna get naked?” in what he obviously thought was a sexy voice. And—well. General idiocy aside, Arthur doubted that anyone with their arms full of a warm and obviously turned on Merlin would have been able to resist an invitation like that.

 

“That has to be the least subtle come-on in the history of come-ons,” he said as he fumbled in the bedside drawer for supplies. “I hope you’re not planning on using it on anyone else.”

 

“Why not?” Merlin just grinned at him, apparently unfazed by Arthur’s comment. “It worked on you, didn’t it? I’m one for one so far.”

 

“We haven’t even _done_ anything yet,” Arthur pointed out. “Don’t count your chickens before they’re hatched. Besides, I’m pretty sure anything you’d said would have worked on me.” He realised what he’d said a moment after the words left his mouth, but he still threw a condom at Merlin when he snickered loudly in response. “Shut up, idiot.”

 

“Make me,” Merlin said, which was also pretty unsubtle, when you got right down to it, but which Arthur had about as much chance of resisting as he had of setting foot on the moon. Kissing Merlin, he was rapidly coming to learn, was not only a very effective way to shut him up, but it was also damn near addictive.

 

Eventually, kissing turned into groping, and groping became a wild race to see who could get the other’s clothes off first without either overbalancing or falling off the bed. Merlin won, largely because his ears got tangled up in his shirt when Arthur tried to pull it over his head, allowing him time to sneak ahead and strip Arthur down to his underwear (though how he managed to do that while blindfolded by his own t-shirt, Arthur would never know). And then they were sitting opposite one another once again, completely bare, staring at each other’s cocks for a moment before glancing away again as though they weren’t sure where to look.

 

“I feel like I’ve never seen a naked man before,” Merlin said, with a nervous giggle. Arthur could relate. It wasn’t as though they hadn’t seen one another in various states of undress before—living in the same flat, it would have been hard to avoid the occasional breach of privacy, even if they hadn’t forgotten the meaning of ‘personal space’ a long time ago—but in this case, context was everything. It was one thing for Merlin to stumble into the kitchen first thing in the morning without his shirt on, or for him to accidentally walk into the bathroom just as Arthur was getting out of the shower; it was quite another thing altogether to have Merlin _right there,_ close enough to touch, wearing nothing but his birthday suit and a bashful grin.

 

“Well, I hope it lives up to your expectations, then,” Arthur said, wiggling his hips so that his cock bobbed comically in front of him. Merlin snorted out a laugh, then had to stop what he was doing for a moment as the condom nearly slipped out of his fingers.

 

“That remains to be seen,” he said seriously, recapturing the sheath before it could slide off completely. “Can you make it do tricks? Wear a pointy hat and tap-dance?” He widened his eyes for dramatic effect. “Gwaine could make his juggle.”

 

“I’ll teach it to dance a Highland jig if it will make you happy,” Arthur promised, and he meant it as a joke, for the most part, but maybe Merlin heard what he was really saying underneath the flippant words. When he looked up, he was smiling.

 

“You’re being nice to me again,” he said, finishing with the condom at last and leaning over to kiss Arthur softly on the mouth. “You’d better watch out, I might start getting used to it.”

 

“That might not be such a bad thing,” Arthur murmured back, crooking his fingers just slightly against Merlin’s armpits in the ghost of a tickle. Merlin’s breath hitched and he shifted forward, kissing Arthur again more deeply as the tip of his cock slid between Arthur’s thighs. It wasn’t an unpleasant feeling by any means—quite the opposite, in fact—but Arthur couldn’t help tensing slightly, the realisation of exactly what he was doing and with whom striking him anew as his body reacted to the sensation. Merlin pulled back from him at once.

 

“You all right?” he said. “Arthur?”

 

“Yeah, fine,” Arthur said, then reconsidered. “Just—this doesn’t feel a little weird to you?”

 

“Not weird exactly.” Merlin’s thumbs stroked along his cheekbones gently, smoothing out the lines of tension in his jaw. “But a little unexpected, yeah? I don’t think my brain has quite caught up to the fact that this is actually happening.”

 

“Mine either,” Arthur confessed, leaning into the touch. “I keep expecting to wake up and have it all be some kind of crazy dream.” He opened his eyes again to find Merlin looking at him with open affection. “What?”

 

“You’re just a big old softie underneath all that bluster, aren’t you?” he said, and Arthur could feel his cheeks turning red. “I bet you secretly read soft porn romance novels and cry over kitten adverts, don’t you? _Don’t you_ , Arthur?”

 

“I _do not_ ,” Arthur grumped, and had to hide his grin when Merlin started meowing plaintively in his ear like a dying cat. “Oh my god, why am I in love with you?”

 

Merlin seemed to think kissing him was enough of a response, his mouth hot and wet against Arthur’s own, and Arthur was content to let him do it, burying his hands in Merlin’s hair to tug him close. This time, when Merlin’s cock brushed against his stomach, Arthur didn’t flinch away but moved towards him, guiding Merlin’s questing hands along his flanks until they were cupping his bare arse. “Come on, then,” he said, screwing up his courage. He heard Merlin catch his breath.

 

“You sure?” he asked, nosing at the skin behind Arthur’s ear. “We could just get each other off like this, if you want. It’s okay.”

 

“I’m sure if you are.” Not that the prospect wasn’t tempting, but Arthur already knew how he wanted this night to go. “Maybe next time.”

 

“I like that you’re already assuming there will be a next time.” Merlin pulled away from him with one last, lingering kiss, then stretched back towards the pillow where he’d dropped the lube. “You want to do this bit?” he asked, holding out the bottle. Relieved, Arthur nodded.

 

“Sorry,” he said. “I just—”

 

“It’s all right.” Merlin pressed a kiss to his shoulder that made Arthur’s stomach flutter. “It’s fine. This way, I get to watch.”

 

Being the one in control helped a little, and Arthur regained some of his confidence as he pressed first one finger and then another inside his hole. It helped that Merlin was making good on his promise and watching him avidly, his eyes focused on Arthur’s fingers as they moved in and out of his body, one hand stroking his cock.

 

“Like that?” Arthur asked huskily. At Merlin’s nod, he spread his legs a little, putting on a bit of a show, and grinned when he heard Merlin’s bitten-off little moan. Okay. He could do this. _They_ could do this. It wasn’t as if he’d never slept with a guy before; it was just like riding a bike.

 

Or, well, it would be. Assuming Arthur ever got around to actually _riding_ the thing, anyway.

 

“How many elbows do you _have_?” he grunted in despair the second time Merlin winded him with an accidental jab to the gut. “And why aren’t they under better control? You’d think after all this time you’d have figured out how to use them.”

 

“I’m _trying_ ,” Merlin grunted back, withdrawing the offending limb while simultaneously kneeing Arthur in the groin. “Sorry. Sorry! I didn’t mean to—”

 

At last, Arthur pushed Merlin down onto the mattress and straddled him again, reasoning that at least this way there would be fewer body parts to keep track of. Merlin seemed to approve—in any case, he didn’t protest as Arthur lined himself up and sank onto him, jettisoning any idea of finesse in the interests of practicality. And then, finally— _finally_ —he had Merlin’s cock inside him, his hole stretched tight around the substantial girth, his muscles straining as he fought to relax past the instinctive resistance of his body. Merlin coaxed him through it, stroking his thighs and pushing up into him with little hitching motions, and when at last Arthur was properly seated he reached up and began petting Arthur’s chest absently with one hand, the two of them struggling to catch their breath.

 

“So,” Merlin said, after a few minutes of winded silence, a hint of amusement colouring his voice. “How about this weather we’ve been having, huh?”

 

Choking, Arthur dropped his head onto Merlin’s shoulder and groaned. “Why is this so fucking awkward?” he whined, and Merlin laughed and stroked his hair.

 

“I’m sorry, were you expecting to be all suave and debonair with my dick up your arse?”

 

“I was hoping our first time would be a _little_ less gauche,” Arthur said drily. “But I see now that trying to take things seriously with you around is a losing proposition.”

 

“I can take things seriously,” Merlin said, mock offended. “I take some things very seriously, such as the fact that if you don’t get your shit together soon, my dick is going to fall off and we’re going to end up in A&E like that bloke who got a dildo stuck up his bum, only instead of a dildo it’ll be my bits—”

 

Arthur started to snigger in spite of himself, burying his face in Merlin’s neck as Merlin waved his arms and said, “What? This could be a serious problem!” before he started laughing as well, his whole body shaking. The movement made his cock jerk where it was buried inside Arthur, and in response Arthur gave an experimental roll of his hips, enjoying the way it made Merlin gasp a little beneath him. A tingle of anticipation spread up his spine, and he could feel it, then, how they would fit together, the slow trickle of pleasure that threatened to become a raging flood.

 

“Arthur—”

 

“Shh.” Arthur leaned forward, bracing himself on the mattress either side of Merlin’s head and concentrating on taking him in deeper. It had been a while since he had slept with a man, but in any case this time felt different; more like it meant something. He wanted to make sure he got it right. “I think I’m starting to remember how this goes.”

 

Merlin’s splutter of indignation turned into another moan as Arthur bore down on him again, and on his next thrust he caught at Arthur’s waist, steadying him, his grip tightening as they began by degrees to find their rhythm. With each fresh movement of Merlin’s cock inside him, Arthur could feel the remains of his anxiety falling away, until he had no more room to feel anything at all beyond the great balloon of happiness that was expanding inside his chest. Awkward and ridiculous though he might be, this was _Merlin_ , Arthur’s dearest friend in the world, and apparently that was all it took to make even the most disastrous of first dates seem perfect after all.

 

“Hey, Merlin?” he whispered, when he felt sure his heart would burst if he didn’t say _something_ , cheesiness be damned. “Don’t look now, but I think maybe we’re going to be okay.”

 

“We’re going to be better than okay,” Merlin corrected him, tilting his head up to steal another kiss. “We’re going to be bloody brilliant, just you watch.”

 


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I can't believe it's been exactly a year to the day since this was first posted! Thank you so much to everyone who stuck with the story for so long, and to those of you who stumbled across it along the way. Please accept this extra chapter of silly fluff (seriously, it has more sugar in it than Merlin's cereal) as a token of my gratitude <333

 

**ONE YEAR LATER**

 

It was a beautiful wedding.

 

Gwen looked resplendent in a diaphanous white gown, and Sefa, who had chosen to wear a dark grey suit, beamed radiantly as soon as she saw her wife-to-be coming down the aisle. They had decided to get married in an old church in the town where Gwen’s mother had been buried, as a symbolic way of including her in the ceremony, and the whole place had been festooned with flowers and garlands for the occasion. Even Arthur had to admit that it was impressive, and Merlin—the great softie—had teared up with delight as soon as he had seen the place. Or possibly that had been because of his allergies. Either way, he spent most of the afternoon sniffling into his handkerchief, and had nearly asphyxiated himself in his eagerness to catch the bouquet, but apart from that the two of them had had a wonderful time.

 

“It’s good to be home, though,” Merlin admitted, preceding Arthur down the hallway of their flat and into the kitchen. As per usual, he left a trail of mess and detritus in his wake, not bothering to hang up his coat or put his luggage away in his— _their_ , Arthur reminded himself—bedroom before making a beeline for his favourite snack. “Ealdor is a nice place, but I wouldn’t want to live there.”

 

“Neither would I.” Shaking his head, Arthur picked up his boyfriend’s coat and hung it on the rack, then grabbed their suitcases from the doorway and dragged them down the hall. He dumped them on their (now larger, and much more comfortable) bed ready to be unpacked and began to undress. Unlike some people, _he_ was civilised enough to want to change his clothes after a long day of travel, and maybe wash off some of the grime before he turned his attention to his stomach, but he already knew that trying to keep Merlin from his cereal was a dangerous proposition. If he wanted to keep all of his limbs intact, interference of any kind was probably best avoided. “That place was so small, you could walk from one end to the other in under an hour. I thought the church was nice, though.”

 

“It really was,” Merlin agreed. “All that stained glass. Did you know those windows were installed back in the 13th century?”

 

“No, Merlin, I didn’t. It’s not like you told me so every half an hour, or anything.”

 

He heard Merlin’s huff of exasperation even from this distance, and grinned as he loosened the tie around his neck. Merlin's fascination with the chapel’s early modern architecture hadn’t exactly come as a surprise, but that didn’t mean Arthur wasn’t going to tease him about it at every opportunity.

 

“I’ll have you know that it was only once every hour at most,” Merlin said primly, clattering around the kitchen as he prepared his cereal. “And I still think the one in the main window looked a lot like—oh.” There was the sound of something heavy dropping into a bowl, and Merlin stopped talking.

 

“Merlin?” Arthur turned, and when Merlin didn’t answer he hurried towards the kitchen, tossing his tie haphazardly towards their bed as he did so. He was half expecting something terrible to have happened—visions of knife-wounds and severed fingers danced through his head—but Merlin was perfectly fine, aside from the fact that he was standing rooted to the spot in front of the kitchen counter, staring at his cereal like it was going to eat _him_ instead of the other way around.

 

“Oh.” Arthur stopped in the doorway, biting his bottom lip. Merlin’s expression was blank with shock, his eyes wide as he stared at the dark blue jewellery box sitting in his bowl. Arthur couldn’t tell if he was pleased or horrified by what he was seeing. “I was wondering when you were going to get around to finishing those.”

 

“I was saving them,” Merlin said faintly, “for a special occasion.”

 

“I thought you might be.” Hesitant, Arthur took another step forward, trying to read the look on Merlin’s face. “Does this count?”

 

When Merlin finally glanced up at him, his eyes were wet. “Of course it bloody counts, you idiot,” he said. “I just—I never thought you’d actually—” He let out a shaky laugh, wiping his face with the back of one hand. “You’re an utter prat, you know that? I _knew_ something was going on when you didn’t replace this box with those awful bran flakes of yours. I should have realised you were going to pull something like this.”

 

He let out a loud sniff, then reached out and fished the jewellery box from amidst the frosted flakes, brushing some powdered sugar off the lid. When he opened it, however, he gave a snort of laughter.

 

“Really, Arthur?” He drew out the ‘ring’—a piece of gold note-paper cut into a circle—and held it up to the light to inspect it, turning it around to read the message Arthur had written around the edge in bold black letters: _WILL YOU MARRY ME?_ “This is how you’re choosing to propose?”

 

“The actual ring is hidden safely in my bottom drawer,” Arthur told him sheepishly. “I didn’t want to take the risk that something might happen to it. Besides, I thought you might appreciate something…simpler than what I originally had in mind.” He looked at the piece of paper, which Merlin had slid onto his finger. “Does that mean you’re going to say yes?”

 

“That depends,” Merlin said. He looked over at Arthur and tilted his head, gesturing for him to enter the room. “Come here.”

 

Arthur went—slightly warily, although he didn’t _think_ Merlin was going to say no or try to prank him, not about something this important. The expression on his face wasn’t one Arthur was familiar with, but it definitely wasn’t his _I-am-about-to-deliver-bad-news-so-please-don’t-hate-me_ face, nor was it his _how-do-I-let-you-down-gently_ face, both of which Arthur had been dreading when this moment finally arrived. He stopped on the linoleum in front of Merlin and waited.

 

“Well?”

 

Merlin reached over and kissed him, slow and sweet. “I have a confession to make.”

 

“That sounds ominous.”

 

“It’s the good kind of confession,” Merlin assured him. “At least, I hope so. Check the fridge.”

 

“The fridge?” Arthur stared at him, nonplussed, but Merlin turned him around bodily and gave him a little shove, and so he went, opening the refrigerator door with mild trepidation. There was a bottle of champagne inside, a shiny, metallic object tied around the neck with a silver ribbon.

 

“You didn’t.”

 

“You beat me to it by roughly twelve hours,” Merlin confirmed, grinning lopsidedly. “By pure accident, mind you. I knew we were going to be travelling all day today, but I didn't want you to think I'd forgotten our anniversary, so...I figured I'd surprise you when we got back. Does that answer your question?”

 

“Well, I don’t know.” Arthur shut the fridge and turned towards him. “I mean, I’d hate to embarrass myself by making assumptions here. Maybe you were hoping I was going to say no. Maybe this is your roundabout way of breaking up with—mmph!”

 

“Prat,” Merlin muttered in between kisses, pulling away from Arthur only to tug him close again a moment later. “Of course I’m saying yes, you ass. On one condition.”

 

“Which is?”

 

Merlin grinned at him, hooking his arms around Arthur’s neck and leaning in to whisper in his ear, “Please don't let there be flowers at the wedding.”

 


End file.
